The USSR from Tractor Drivers to Tank drivers against Fascism
The Conquest of Catalan Barcelona by Franco in 1939 for Fascism and Spain - Independence for Catalonia in 2017 ?
Saturday, September 30, 2017
Трактористы/The tractors drivers(1939) - Tractor Drivers 2017 Defending Catalonia's Polling Stations
The USSR from Tractor Drivers to Tank drivers against Fascism
The Conquest of Catalan Barcelona by Franco in 1939 for Fascism and Spain - Independence for Catalonia in 2017 ?
The State and Revolution in Catalan - L'Estat i la Revolució by EINA
Statement in Catalan and Spanish of Solidarity with struggle in Catalonia
"L'organització Yr Aflonyddwch Mawr de Gal•les afirma que la lluita catalana és bàsicament una lluita per la democràcia contra un Estat espanyol burgès corrupte, que ha pres una forma nacional a Catalunya.
No obstant això, el lideratge nacionalista català busca subordinar a Catalunya a una Brussel•les corrupta i a la Unió Europea, no és l'alliberament nacional, sinó un simple reajustament entre els burgesos nacionals de l'Estat espanyol i d'Europa.
L'Esquerra Revolucionària de Catalunya s´ha d'oposar tant al corrupte Estat espanyol com a la corrupta Unió Europa, l'OTAN i elevar a la classe obrera al lideratge polític de la lluita nacional per la democràcia a Catalunya. La classe obrera ha de guanyar la direcció de l'alliberament nacional.
Suport a la declaració unilateral d'independència de Catalunya.
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La organización Yr Aflonyddwch Mawr de Gales afirma que la lucha catalana es básicamente una lucha por la democracia contra un Estado español burgués corrupto, que ha tomado una forma nacional en Cataluña.
Sin embargo, el liderazgo nacionalista catalán busca subordinar a Cataluña a una Bruselas corrupta y a la Unión Europea, no es la liberación nacional, sino un simple reajuste entre los burgueses nacionales del Estado español y de Europa.
La Izquierda Revolucionaria de Cataluña debe oponerse tanto al corrupto Estado español como a la corrupta Unión Europa, la OTAN y elevar a la clase obrera al liderazgo político de la lucha nacional por la democracia en Cataluña. La clase obrera debe ganar la dirección de la liberación nacional.
Apoyo a la declaración unilateral de independencia de Catalunya.
Socialism and Independence
Yr Aflonyddwch Mawr in Wales says the Catalan struggle is basically a struggle for democracy against a corrupt bourgeois Spanish State which has taken a national form in Catalonia.
However the bourgeois nationalist Catalan leadership seeks to subordinate Catalonia to a corrupt Brussels and the European Union - this is not national liberation but a readjustment among the national bourgeois in the Spanish State and Europe.
The Revolutionary Left in Catalonia should oppose both the corrupt Spanish State and the corrupt European Union and NATO and elevate the working class to political leadership of the national struggle for democracy in Catalonia - the working class should win the direction of national liberation.
Support a unilateral declaration of independence
SEE ASLO _https://democracyandclasstruggle.blogspot.co.uk/2017/09/the-national-question-once-again.html
Pablo Hasél,,, Fuego al Estado español
Statement in Catalan and Spanish of Solidarity with struggle in Catalonia
"L'organització Yr Aflonyddwch Mawr de Gal•les afirma que la lluita catalana és bàsicament una lluita per la democràcia contra un Estat espanyol burgès corrupte, que ha pres una forma nacional a Catalunya.
No obstant això, el lideratge nacionalista català busca subordinar a Catalunya a una Brussel•les corrupta i a la Unió Europea, no és l'alliberament nacional, sinó un simple reajustament entre els burgesos nacionals de l'Estat espanyol i d'Europa.
L'Esquerra Revolucionària de Catalunya s´ha d'oposar tant al corrupte Estat espanyol com a la corrupta Unió Europa, l'OTAN i elevar a la classe obrera al lideratge polític de la lluita nacional per la democràcia a Catalunya. La classe obrera ha de guanyar la direcció de l'alliberament nacional.
Suport a la declaració unilateral d'independència de Catalunya.
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La organización Yr Aflonyddwch Mawr de Gales afirma que la lucha catalana es básicamente una lucha por la democracia contra un Estado español burgués corrupto, que ha tomado una forma nacional en Cataluña.
Sin embargo, el liderazgo nacionalista catalán busca subordinar a Cataluña a una Bruselas corrupta y a la Unión Europea, no es la liberación nacional, sino un simple reajuste entre los burgueses nacionales del Estado español y de Europa.
La Izquierda Revolucionaria de Cataluña debe oponerse tanto al corrupto Estado español como a la corrupta Unión Europa, la OTAN y elevar a la clase obrera al liderazgo político de la lucha nacional por la democracia en Cataluña. La clase obrera debe ganar la dirección de la liberación nacional.
Apoyo a la declaración unilateral de independencia de Catalunya.
Socialism and Independence
Yr Aflonyddwch Mawr in Wales says the Catalan struggle is basically a struggle for democracy against a corrupt bourgeois Spanish State which has taken a national form in Catalonia.
However the bourgeois nationalist Catalan leadership seeks to subordinate Catalonia to a corrupt Brussels and the European Union - this is not national liberation but a readjustment among the national bourgeois in the Spanish State and Europe.
The Revolutionary Left in Catalonia should oppose both the corrupt Spanish State and the corrupt European Union and NATO and elevate the working class to political leadership of the national struggle for democracy in Catalonia - the working class should win the direction of national liberation.
Support a unilateral declaration of independence
See also -https://democracyandclasstruggle.blogspot.co.uk/2017/09/the-national-question-once-again.html
La izquierda cosmopolita y la cuestión nacional, por Nicholas Glais
Reproducimos a continuación el artículo “The Cosmopolitan Left and the National Question by Nickglais””, firmado por Nick Glais, del blog Democracy and Class Struggle, y traducido del inglés al castellano por el blog Victoriade los Oprimidos y Explotados. Es un artículo dedicado a los comunistas “puristas” que desprecian las luchas de las naciones oprimidas y el concepto de nacionalidad.
He observado diversos comentarios expresando su preocupación acerca de cómo algunos camaradas en Europa, involucrados en luchas nacionales, son de una menor “pureza” socialista, menos comunistas, menos maoístas, etc. En particular este tipo de comentarios procede de RCPUSA, así como de Mike Ely de Kasama.
Esta idea refleja una peligrosa visión burguesa cosmopolita del mundo.
Sin embargo, esta idea está profundamente arraigada en la izquierda británica, que rechaza el nacionalismo como una antigua idea del siglo XIX. Al fin y al cabo, la izquierda británica se parece mucho a aquella primera burguesía: son ciudadanos del mundo.
Esta visión cosmopolita del burgués ciudadano del mundo no tiene nada en común con el socialismo y el internacionalismo, como se puede ver si se estudia el marxismo.
´
Ya en el siglo XIX, Marx ridiculizó esta perspectiva supranacional de determinados representantes muy revolucionarios, como los franceses proudhonistas o algunos socialistas como Paul Lafargue, que buscaban desechar la idea de nación como un prejuicio anticuado y centrarse en la cuestión social, excluyendo las cuestiones nacionales.
En el Consejo Internacional de la Primera Internacional en 1868 se produjo una discusión que Marx describió así:
“Los representantes de la Joven Francia salieron con el anuncio de que todas las nacionalidades e incluso naciones eran prejuicios anticuados… todo el mundo está esperando a que los franceses estén listos para la revolución social… quienquiera impedir la cuestión social con las supersticiones del viejo mundo es reaccionario.” (...) “Los ingleses se rieron mucho cuando empecé mi discurso diciendo que nuestro amigo Lafargue y otros habían puesto fin a las nacionalidades hablándonos en “francés”, es decir, un lenguaje que nueve décimas partes de la audiencia no entendían.” (...) “También sugerí que por la negación de las nacionalidades él parecía inconscientemente entender su absorción en el modelo de la nación francesa” (Carta de Marx a Engels el 20 de junio de 1866).
Lenin aclaró esta cuestión a los socialistas que trataban de oponer la lucha por el “socialismo puro” a la lucha nacional y a quienes despreciaban la independencia nacional y la soberanía. Lenin dijo:
“Imaginar que una revolución social es concebible sin las revueltas de las naciones pequeñas en las colonias y en Europa, sin los estallidos revolucionarios de un sector de la pequeña burguesía con todos sus prejuicios, sin el movimiento de la no consciente clase proletaria y masas semiproletarias contra la opresión de los terratenientes, la iglesia, la monarquía, las naciones extranjeras, etc. Imaginar esto significa repudiar la revolución. Sólo aquellos que imaginan que un ejército se plantará y dirá “Nosotros estamos por el socialismo” y en otro lugar un ejército dirá “Luchamos por el Imperialismo” y que esto será una revolución social, únicamente aquellos que mantengan una opinión tan ridículamente pedante, podrían vilipendiar la rebelión irlandesa llamándola un “golpe de Estado” (...) “Quien espere una “revolución social pura nunca vivirá para verla, esa persona defiende de boquilla la revolución, sin comprender qué es una revolución” (Lenin – Síntesis sobre la Discusión sobre la autodeterminación- 1916)
Nota del autor: Marx y Engels vieron en el cosmopolitismo un reflejo ideológico del capitalismo. Consideraban el capitalismo de mercado como intrínsecamente expansivo, quebrador de los límites del sistema del Estado-nación, como lo evidenciaba el hecho de que la producción y el consumo se habían adaptado a tierras lejanas.
Para Marx y Engels, la palabra ‘cosmopolita’ está ligada a los efectos de la globalización capitalista, incluyendo especialmente la ideología burguesa que legitima el ‘libre’ comercio en términos de libertad individual y beneficio mutuo, aunque este mismo orden capitalista sea la causa de la miseria de millones de personas, de hecho, la causa de la existencia misma del proletariado.
Nota: Robert Jones Derfel, “Gwladgarwch y Cymry” “El patriotismo de los galeses”
"Mae’r dyn sydd yn casau ac yn esgeuluso ei wlad a’i genedl yn unannhebyg iawn o fod yn caru dyn mewn unrhyw wlad arall. Os nad yw yn caru’r genedl y mae yn ei hadnabod,pa fodd y gall garu’r rhai sydd yn anadnabyddus iddo".
"El hombre que odia y descuida su tierra y su nación es poco probable que ame a la gente de cualquier otra tierra. Si no ama a la nación que conoce, cómo puede amar a aquellas de las que no sabe nada".
France's 500,000 Catalans want more regional autonomy
Democracy and Class Struggle says the sweet devotion of much of the French Left to the French Centralised State is frankly astonishing for such a militant working class culture - if they have not studied Lenin on Imperialist Economism - it is never to late to learn and 2017 would be a good year to begin.
See Also
https://democracyandclasstruggle.blogspot.co.uk/2017/09/the-national-question-once-again.html
Friday, September 29, 2017
Thursday, September 28, 2017
The National Question Once Again - Concerning the article by Semich
In 1925, criticising Semich for underestimating the importance of the right of secession, he notes that Semich quotes from Stalin’s theses the passage -The national question is a struggle of the bourgeois classes among themselves.
Democracy and Class Struggle opposes the Imperialist States of Britain and France and Spain - these Imperialist States arose by conquering the nations within those states and practiced in many cases colonial practices on those conquered nations - before exporting those colonial practices to overseas colonies - it is time for the nations in these states to begin their process of National and Social Liberation.
Our Comrades in Wales statement on Catalonia captures the democratic content of these national struggles.
Yr Aflonyddwch Mawr says the Catalan struggle is basically a struggle for democracy against a corrupt bourgeois Spanish State which has taken a national form in Catalonia.
However the bourgeois nationalist Catalan leadership seeks to subordinate Catalonia to a corrupt Brussels and the European Union - this is not national liberation but a readjustment among the national bourgeois in the Spanish State and Europe.
The Revolutionary Left in Catalonia should oppose both the corrupt Spanish State and the corrupt European Union and NATO and elevate the working class to political leadership of the national struggle for democracy in Catalonia - the working class should win the direction of national liberation.
Democracy and Class Struggles says we must oppose revisionism on the National Question which does not recognize these popular mass struggles as part of the democratic class struggle for socialism and develop the Marxist Leninist Maoist Position on Imperialist States and national struggles within those States.
Whether it was Marx ridiculing Paul Lafargue who said that socialism had abolished nationalities has he addressed the First International in French language which nine tenths of the audience did not understand - to Lenin in a bout of criticism and self criticism who castigated those that oppose pure socialism to the national struggle something he had been prone to do before the First World War .
Lenin had opened his eyes wide open to Imperialism and the National Question in 1916 as a result of the Easter Rising and we thank James Connolly for his education of Lenin on this question.
Lenin denounced Imperialist Economism on the National Question
It was the doctrine that it was sufficient for a workers’ party to prefer proletarian demands, and that democratic demands were not their business.
Imperialist Economism is something that pervades vast sections of the erstwhile Left Today even those that have the pretense to be revolutionary and is one of the contributing factors to the renewed strength of the political right.
Stalin was even critical of his pre First World War Marxism and The National Question article because its was a pre Imperialist analysis of the the National Question.
Stalin Wrote :
“Stalin’s pamphlet was written before the imperialist war, at the time when the national question had not yet assumed world-wide significance in the eyes of Marxists, and when the basic demands concerning the right to self-determination were considered to be, not a part of the proletarian revolution, but a part of the bourgeois-democratic revolution. It would be absurd to ig-nore the fact that since then a fundamental change has taken place in the international situation, that the war on the one hand and the October revolu-tion in Russia on the other has converted the national question from being a particle of the bourgeois-democratic revolution into a particle of the proletar-ian-socialist revolution.”
Revolutionary Marxism Leninism did not stop developing its work on the National Question in the 1920's but was further developed by Ibrahim Kaypakkaya who was inspired by Mao Zedong Thought in Turkey in the 1970's with his path breaking work on the Kurdish National Question which brought clarity to the communist movement on the Kurdish Question unlike the Post Nationalism of Abdullah Ocalan which has brought nothing but confusion.
Ibrahim Kaypakkaya is a solid base on which to develop a Marxist Leninist Maoist View of the National Question and Imperialism in the 21st Century in the spirit of Marx Engels Lenin Stalin and Mao Zedong.
Democracy and Class Struggle is a platform for the further development of Marxism Leninism Maoism on the National Question and Imperialism.
A Europe of Nations
READ OUR ARTICLE ON FUTURE OF UK AND EUROPEAN UNION
https://democracyandclasstruggle.blogspot.co.uk/2017/03/article-50-and-national-and-social_29.html
The National Question Once Again by J V Stalin
Concerning the Article by Semich
June 30, 1925
Source : Works, Vol. 7, 1925
Publisher : Foreign Languages Publishing House, Moscow, 1954
One can only welcome the fact that now, after the discussion that took place in the Yugoslav Commission, Semich, in his article, wholly and entirely associates himself with the stand taken by the R.C.P.(B.) delegation in the Comintern.
It would be wrong, however, to think on these grounds that there were no disagreements between the R.C.P.(B.) delegation and Semich before or during the discussion in the Yugoslav Commission. Evidently, that is exactly what Semich is inclined to think about the disagreements on the national question, in trying to reduce them just to misunderstandings. Unfortunately, he is profoundly mistaken.
He asserts in his article that the dispute with him is based on a "series of misunderstandings" caused by "one, not fully translated," speech he delivered in the Yugoslav Commission. In other words, it follows that we must make a scapegoat of the person who, for some reason, did not translate Semich's speech in full.
In the interests of the truth I must declare that this assertion of Semich's is quite contrary to the facts It would have been better, of course, had Semich supported his assertion with passages from the speech he delivered in the Yugoslav Commission, the report of which is kept in the Comintern files. But for some reason he did not do this. Consequently, I am compelled to go through this not very pleasant, but very necessary, procedure for him.
This is all the more necessary since even now, after Semich has wholly associated himself with the stand taken by the R.C.P.(B.) delegation, there is still much that is unclear in his present position.
In my speech in the Yugoslav Commission (see Bolshevik,1 No. 7) I spoke of disagreements on three questions: 1) the question of the ways of solving the national question, 2) the question of the internal social content of the national movement in the present historical epoch, and 3) the question of the role of the international factor in the national question.
On the first question I said that Semich had "not fully understood the main essence of the Bolshevik presentation of the national question," that he separated the national question from the general question of the revolution, and that, consequently, he was inclined to reduce the national question to a constitutional issue.
Is all that true?
Read the following passage from Semich's speech in the Yugoslav Commission (March 30, 1925) and judge for yourselves:
"Can the national question be reduced to a constitutional issue?
First of all, let us make a theoretical supposition. Let us suppose that in state X there are three nations A, B, and C. These three nations express the wish to live in one state. What is the issue in this case? It is, of course, the regulation of the internal relationships within this state. Hence, it is a constitutional issue. In this theoretical case the national question amounts to a constitutional issue. . . . If, in this theoretical case, we reduce the national question to a constitutional issue, it must be said — as I have always emphasised — that the self-determination of nations, including secession, is a condition for the solution of the constitutional issue. And it is solely on this plane that I put the constitutional issue."
I think that this passage from Semich's speech needs no further comment.
Clearly, whoever regards the national question as a component part of the general question of the proletarian revolution cannot reduce it to a constitutional issue.
And vice versa, only one who separates the national question from the general question of the proletarian revolution can reduce it to a constitutional issue.
Semich's speech contains a statement to the effect that the right to national self-determination cannot be won without a revolutionary struggle. Semich says: "Of course, such rights can be won only by means of a revolutionary struggle.
They cannot be won by parliamentary means; they can result only from mass revolutionary actions." But what do "revolutionary struggle" and "revolutionary actions" mean? Can "revolutionary struggle" and "revolutionary actions" be identified with the overthrow of the ruling class, with the seizure of power, with the victory of the revolution as a condition for the solution of the national question? Of course not.
To speak of the victory of the revolution as the fundamental condition for the solution of the national question is one thing; but it is quite another thing to put "revolutionary actions" and "revolutionary struggle" as the condition for the solution of the national question. It must be observed that the path of reforms, the constitutional path, by no means excludes "revolutionary actions" and "revolutionary struggle."
Decisive in determining whether a given party is revolutionary or reformist are not "revolutionary actions" in themselves, but the political aims and objects for the sake of which the party undertakes and employs these actions.
As is known, in 1906, after the first Duma was dispersed, the Russian Mensheviks proposed the organisation of a "general strike" and even of an "armed uprising." But that did not in the least prevent them from remaining Men-sheviks, for why did they propose all this at that time?
Not, of course, to smash tsarism and to organise the complete victory of the revolution, but in order to "exert pressure" on the tsarist government with the object of winning reforms, with the object of widening the "constitution," with the object of securing the convocation of an "improved" Duma. "Revolutionary actions" for the purpose of reforming the old order, while power remains in the hands of the ruling class is one thing — that is the constitutional path. "Revolutionary actions" for the purpose of breaking up the old order, for overthrowing the ruling class, is another thing — that is the revolutionary path, the path of the complete victory of the revolution. There is a fundamental difference here.
That is why I think that Semich's reference to "revolutionary struggle" while reducing the national question to a constitutional issue does not refute, but, on the contrary, only confirms my statement that Semich had "not fully understood the main essence of the Bolshevik presentation of the national question," for he failed to understand that the national question must be regarded not in isolation from, but in inseparable connection with, the question of the victory of the revolution, as part of the general question of the revolution.
While insisting on this, I do not in the least mean to imply that I have said anything new about Semich's mistake on this question. Not at all. This mistake of Semich's was already mentioned by Comrade Manuil-sky at the Fifth Congress of the Comintern2 when he said:
"In his pamphlet The National Question in the Light of Marxism, and in a number of articles published in Radnik, the organ of the Communist Party of Yugoslavia, Semich advocates a struggle for the revision of the Constitution as a practical slogan for the Communist Party, that is, he in fact reduces the whole question of self-determination of nations exclusively to a constitutional issue" (see Stenographic Report of the Fifth Congress, pp. 596-97).
Zinoviev, too, spoke about this same mistake in the Yugoslav Commission, when he said:
"In the prospect drawn by Semich it appears that only one little thing is lacking, namely, revolution," that the national question is a "revolutionary and not a constitutional" problem (see Pravda, No. 83).
These remarks by representatives of the R.C.P.(B.) in the Comintern concerning Semich's mistake could not have been accidental, groundless. There is no smoke without fire.
That is how matters stand with Semich's first and fundamental mistake.
His other mistakes arise directly from this fundamental mistake.
Concerning the second question, I said in my speech (see Bolshevik, No. 7) that Semich "refuses to regard the national question as being, in essence, a peasant question."
Is that true?
Read the following passage from Semich's speech in the Yugoslav Commission and judge for yourselves:
"What is the social significance of the national movement in Yugoslavia?" asks Semich, and he answers there: "Its social content is the competitive struggle between Serb capital on the one hand and Croat and Slovene capital on the other" (see Semich's speech in the Yugoslav Commission).
There can be no doubt, of course, that the competitive struggle between the Slovene and Croat bourgeoisie and the Serb bourgeoisie is bound to play a certain role here. But it is equally beyond doubt that a man who thinks that the social significance of the national movement lies in the competitive struggle between the bourgeoisies of the different nationalities cannot regard the national question as being, in essence, a peasant question.
What is the essence of the national question today, when this question has been transformed from a local, intra-state question into a world question, a question of the struggle waged by the colonies and dependent nationalities against imperialism?
The essence of the national question today lies in the struggle that the masses of the people of the colonies and dependent nationalities are waging against financial exploitation, against the political enslavement and cultural effacement of those colonies and nationalities by the imperialist bourgeoisie of the ruling nationality.
What significance can the competitive struggle between the bourgeoisies of different nationalities have when the national question is presented in that way? Certainly not decisive significance, and, in certain cases, not even important significance. It is quite evident that the main point here is not that the bourgeoisie of one nationality is beating, or may beat, the bourgeoisie of another nationality in the competitive struggle, but that the imperialist group of the ruling nationality is exploiting and oppressing the bulk of the masses, above all the peasant masses, of the colonies and dependent nationalities and that, by oppressing and exploiting them, it is drawing them into the struggle against imperialism, converting them into allies of the proletarian revolution.
The national question cannot be regarded as being, in essence, a peasant question if the social significance of the national movement is reduced to the competitive struggle between the bourgeoisies of different nationalities. And vice versa, the competitive struggle between the bourgeoisies of different nationalities cannot be regarded as constituting the social significance of the national movement if the national question is regarded as being, in essence, a peasant question. These two formulas cannot possibly be taken as equivalent.
Semich refers to a passage in Stalin's pamphlet Marxism and the National Question, written at the end of 1912. There it says that "the national struggle under the conditions of rising capitalism is a struggle of the bourgeois classes among themselves." Evidently, by this Semich is trying to suggest that his formula defining the social significance of the national movement under the present historical conditions is correct.
But Stalin's pamphlet was written before the imperialist war, when the national question was not yet regarded by Marxists as a question of world significance, when the Marxists' fundamental demand for the right to self-determination was regarded not as part of the proletarian revolution, but as part of the bourgeois-democratic revolution. It would be ridiculous not to see that since then the international situation has radically changed, that the war, on the one hand, and the October Revolution in Russia, on the other, transformed the national question from a part of the bourgeois-democratic revolution into a part of the proletarian-socialist revolution.
As far back as October 1916, in his article, "The Discussion on Self-Determination Summed Up," 3 Lenin said that the main point of the national question, the right to self-determination, had ceased to be a part of the general democratic movement, that it had already become a component part of the general proletarian, socialist revolution. I do not even mention subsequent works on the national question by Lenin and by other representatives of Russian communism. After all this, what significance can Semich's reference to the passage in Stalin's pamphlet, written in the period of the bourgeois-democratic revolution in Russia, have at the present time, when, as a consequence of the new historical situation, we have entered a new epoch, the epoch of proletarian revolution? It can only signify that Semich quotes outside of space and time, without reference to the living historical situation, and thereby violates the most elementary requirements of dialectics, and ignores the fact that what is right for one historical situation may prove to be wrong in another historical situation.
In my speech in the Yugoslav Commission I said that two stages must be distinguished in the presentation of the national question by the Russian Bolsheviks: the pre-October stage, when the bourgeois-democratic revolution was the issue and the national question was regarded as a part of the general democratic movement; and the October stage, when the proletarian revolution was already the issue and the national question had become a component part of the proletarian revolution. It scarcely needs proof that this distinction is of decisive significance.
I am afraid that Semich still fails to understand the meaning and significance of this difference between the two stages in the presentation of the national question.
That is why I think Semich's attempt to regard the national movement as not being, in essence, a peasant question, but as a question of the competition between the bourgeoisies of different nationalities "is due to an un-der-estimation of the inherent strength of the national movement and a failure to understand the profoundly popular and profoundly revolutionary character of the national movement" (see Bolshevik, No. 7).
That is how the matter stands with Semich's second mistake.
It is characteristic that the same thing about this mistake of Semich's was said by Zinoviev in his speech in the Yugoslav Commission:
"Semich is wrong when he says that the peasant movement in Yugoslavia is headed by the bourgeoisie and is therefore not revolutionary" (see Pravda, No. 83).
Is this coincidence accidental? Of course, not!
Once again: there is no smoke without fire.
Finally, on the third question I stated that Semich makes an "attempt to treat the national question in Yugoslavia in isolation from the international situation and the probable prospects in Europe."
Is that true?
Yes, it is, for in his speech Semich did not even remotely hint at the fact that the international situation under present conditions, especially in relation to Yugoslavia, is a major factor in the solution of the national question. The fact that the Yugoslav state itself was formed as a result of the clash between the two major imperialist coalitions, that Yugoslavia cannot escape from the big play of forces that is now going on in the surrounding imperialist states — all this remained outside of Semich's field of vision.
Semich's statement that he can fully conceive of certain changes taking place in the international situation which may cause the question of self-determination to become an urgent and practical one, must now, in the present international situation, be regarded as inadequate.
Now it is by no means a matter of admitting that the question of the right of nations to self-determination may become urgent, given certain changes in the international situation, in a possible and distant future; this could, if need be, now be admitted as a prospect even by bourgeois democrats.
That is not the point now. The point now is to avoid making the present frontiers of the Yugoslav state, which came into being as a result of war and violence, the starting point and legal basis for the solution of the national question. One thing or the other: either the question of national self-determination, i.e., the question of radically altering the frontiers of Yugoslavia, is an appendage to the national programme, dimly looming in the distant future, or it is the basis of the national programme.
At all events it is clear that the point about the right to self-determination cannot be at one and the same time both an appendage to and the basis of the national programme of the Yugoslav Communist Party. I am afraid that Semich still continues to regard the right to self-determination as an appendage concerning prospects added to the national programme.
That is why I think that Semich divorces the national question from the question of the general international situation and, as a consequence, for him the question of self-determination, i.e., the question of altering the frontiers of Yugoslavia, is, in essence, not an urgent question, but an academic one.
That is how the matter stands with Semich's third mistake.
It is characteristic that the same thing about this mistake of Semich's was said by Comrade Manuilsky in his report to the Fifth Congress of the Comintern:
"The fundamental premise of Semich's whole presentation of the national question is the idea that the proletariat must accept the bourgeois state within those frontiers which have been set up by a series of wars and acts of violence"* (see Stenographic Report of the Fifth Congress of the Comintern, p. 597).
Can this coincidence be regarded as accidental? Of course, not!
Once again: there is no smoke without fire.
The magazine Bolshevik, No. 11-12, June 30, 1925
Notes
1.Bolshevik, a fortnightly theoretical and political magazine, organ of the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U.(B.); began publication in April 1924.
2.The Fifth Congress of the Comintern was held in Moscow, June 17-July 8, 1924. On June 30, D. Z. Manuilsky delivered a report on the national question.
3.See V. I. Lenin, works, 4th Russ. ed., Vol. 22, pp. 306-44.
Democracy and Class Struggle would update this article of Stalin by saying that the land question rather than just the peasant question is central to a proletarian view of the national struggle against Imperialism - the peasant struggle is associated with feudalism while the land struggle especially struggle around community ownership of land moves the national struggle in democratic direction and can also be post feudal especially in Western Europe.
Kurdistan Independence Vote Faces Fierce Opposition
Democracy and Class Struggle strongly supports a Kurdish State in the Middle East but there are many problems created by the Kurds enemies and we are sorry to say by Kurdish leadership itself and the report on the Yazidis we recently published shows how serious some of the problems are.
International Pressure on Spain mounting about Catalonia's rights
Democracy and Class Struggle says international solidarity is important and has a value because the Spanish State is not comfortable with scrutiny of its actions
Una hora de música socialista-comunista euskera
Democracy and Class Struggle says Red Salute to our Basque brothers and sisters
Tens of thousands of Catalan pro-independence protesters marched on placa Universitat in Barcelona on Thursday.28th September
Placards proclaiming independence were wielded by supporters, with one student protester claiming "we have a destiny, and, it is to be independent."
One Catalan fireman, Roger, explained that the Spanish government are "trying to take up the ballot boxes - as if it were a cocaine or heroin shipment- because for them, this is worse than the drug," adding "they see it as a crime for us to vote, but for us, we believe in democracy."
SOT, Roger, Catalan fireman (Catalonian): "On October 1 the Catalans will vote massively. The occupation forces that we have right here, are continuously trying to invalidate the votes, trying to take up the ballot boxes - as if it were a cocaine or heroin shipment- because for them, this is worse than the drug. They see it as a crime for us to vote, but for us, we believe in democracy"
SOT, Jana, student protester (Catalonian): "I believe - and I am 100% sure - that on October 1 we will end up voting, because no one can stop it. We have a destiny and it is to be independent."
SOT, Pol, student protester, (Catalonian): "I think that on October 1 we will vote yes. I don't think that Spain prohibits us from voting, democracy isn't just yes or no, we are entitled to vote"
SOT, Oriol, protester (Catalonian): "I think that on October 1 we will vote as we are vindicating ourselves now - peacefully. A lot of police want to stop us, but we will end up voting because it is a right we have."
Is Trump Following a ‘Japan First’ Policy Against Kim Jong-un? by Tim Shorrock
Is Trump Following a ‘Japan First’ Policy Against Kim Jong-un?
This article was originally published in The Nation.
By Tim Shorrock
In a speech that will long be remembered for its ugly belligerence, President Trump told the UN General Assembly last week that “if it is forced to defend itself,” the United States was prepared to “totally destroy” North Korea: not just its military, or its leaders, but the entire population. To many heads of state, a threat evoking the destruction of both World War II and the Korean War violated the very idea of the UN as a body dedicated to resolving global tensions with peaceful means.
“This was a bombastic, nationalist speech,” declared Margot Wallstrom, the foreign minister of Sweden, who grimly watched Trump’s outburst with folded arms. “I must say that we consider any type of military solution absolutely inappropriate,” German Chancellor Angela Merkel told a German newspaper. Experts on North Korea, meanwhile, argued that the speech played right into Kim Jong-un’s hands by proving his claim that the United States is North Korea’s mortal enemy.
“President Trump has handed the North Koreans the sound bite of the century,” wrote Marcus Noland, an economist at the Peterson Institute for International Economics who is well-known for his critical analyses of North Korea. “That footage will be used time and time and time again on North Korea’s state television channel.”
Sure enough, Kim followed Trump’s speech with what might be called the insult of the century. In an unprecedented move that sent the Internet into a miasma of laughter and shock, he responded personally to Trump’s threat by calling him a “dotard” and a “frightened dog” that “has rendered the world restless through threats and blackmail against all countries in the world.”
“I will make the man holding the prerogative of the supreme command in the U.S. pay dearly for his speech.” — North Korean leader Kim Jong-un
“On behalf of the dignity and honor of my state and people and on my own,” Kim said, “I will make the man holding the prerogative of the supreme command in the U.S. pay dearly for his speech.” He told Trump to expect “the highest level of hard-line countermeasure in history.” Later, his foreign minister, Ri Yong-ho, suggested that might include a hydrogen bomb test over the Pacific Ocean—and then upped the ante by accusing Trump of making a unilateral “declaration of war” against North Korea.
Clearly, Trump’s threat to obliterate a country with 25 million people, many of them with family and relatives in South Korea, had struck a chord. Trump, naturally, struck back on Twitter by calling Kim a “madman,” and announced at the UN that the United States, South Korea, and Japan had agreed on a new set of US sanctions aimed at punishing any company or country that does business with the North Korean regime.
Then, as if tensions weren’t high enough, on the night of September 23 the Pentagon sent B-1B Lancer bombers, nicknamed “the swan of death,” to fly over international airspace just off the coast of North Korea—“the first time since the Korean War that a U.S. bomber flew over North Korea’s east coast,” according to the Kyunghyang Shinmun, a major daily in Seoul.
Two days later, after Trump tweeted that if Ri and Kim kept up their threats, they “may not be around much longer,” the foreign minister called his bluff. Standing before television cameras in front of his New York hotel, Foreign Minister Ri said that if a state of war existed, North Korea reserved the right to “make countermeasures, including the right to shoot down United States strategic bombers even when they are not inside the airspace border of our country.” That worried longtime US negotiators with North Korea.
“That’s not the Ri Yong-ho I know,” Joseph DeTrani, a former CIA proliferation expert who met with Ri many times as a special envoy to the Six-Party Talks, told The Nation on Monday. But the escalating rhetoric did not meet the approval of the US public: That afternoon, CBS News put out a new poll showing that 53 percent of Americans were concerned that Trump might act too quickly “and start an unneeded war in Korea.”
This week, as pundits debated what the next step would be in this global spectacle, few were asking how the standoff got to this point. Nor was it clear why the Trump administration abandoned the path of diplomacy that its top officials, led by Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, have defined for months as their objective, one strongly embraced by South Korean President Moon Jae-in.
The “military option” has eclipsed negotiations as the US strategy of choice—and a key influence in this hawkish direction may be Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe.
Amazingly, on Monday the administration continued to insist this was the case, with a State Department spokesperson telling reporters (despite the president’s words at the UN) that the “United States has not ‘declared war’ on North Korea,” and that “We continue to seek a peaceful denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula.”
But a review of recent events and US government statements shows, in fact, that the “military option” against North Korea has eclipsed negotiations as the strategy of choice and become almost conventional thinking in Washington. More darkly, it suggests that the key influence on US policy during this period may have been Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, one of the most obsequious, pro-American leaders in modern Asian history.
Just a month ago, things seemed to be looking up in Korea. In mid-August, Kim—derisively dubbed “Rocket Man” in Trump’s UN speech—canceled plans to shoot missiles toward the US military base on Guam, where the B1-Bs that would lead a military attack on North Korea are based. Possibly in response, the Pentagon quietly reduced the number of US troops involved in the upcoming US-South Korean “Ulchi Freedom Guardian” war games, from 25,000 in 2016 to 17,500 this year. They lasted from August 21 to 31.
But the key elements of the exercises so feared by the North, including training in nuclear warfare and “decapitation strikes,” remained. That apparently triggered its decisions to go ahead with another series of missile tests, including two shots fired over the Japanese island of Hokkaido. Then, on September 3, Pyongyang tested its sixth—and largest—nuclear bomb. Even before that, H.R. McMaster, Trump’s national security adviser, had signaled a shift in US policy by speaking openly of a “preventive war” aimed at stopping North Korea’s weapons programs.
In the weeks that followed Pyongyang’s early September test, Trump and his advisers launched a campaign to convince the American public that such a war might succeed. From Secretary of Defense Jim Mattis to UN ambassador Nikki Haley, the idea of a “military option” that could “annihilate” the North became a mantra. Mattis even suggested that the Pentagon was seriously considering an option that could avoid damage to South Korea and other US allies—a claim scoffed at by many analysts, who believe that any US attack on the North would be met with catastrophic retaliation by the North.
For Trump personally, Pyongyang’s latest nuclear test appeared to be the final straw. A few hours after he learned of the explosion, he insulted President Moon by tweeting that South Korea’s “talk of appeasement with North Korea will not work,” and declaring that “talking is not the answer!” Mattis escalated the rhetoric by saying that any “aggression” from North Korea would end with its “total annihilation.” Although the United States is “not looking” for that, he added, “we have many options to do so.”
Since Trump took office, Abe has become his closest confidant on North Korea and the man he inevitably calls first during every crisis.
But North Korea’s actions alone don’t account for this new hard-line posture. Rather, it appears to be the result of the influence of Japan’s Abe, who has become Trump’s most faithful fan and ally on the world stage.
Two years ago in this magazine, I chronicled Abe’s imperialist heritage and his attempts to “transform Japan—with its surprisingly large, tech-driven military-industrial complex—into America’s new proxy army.” Since Trump took office, Abe has become his closest confidant on North Korea and the man he inevitably calls first during every crisis.
Their alliance has deepened since the North Korean missile shots over Japan. Frightened by the possibility of a strike on their island nation, Abe and his supporters have rallied behind Trump’s militant policy toward Pyongyang.
On September 17, right before Trump’s UN speech, Abe published an unusual op-ed in The New York Times endorsing the idea of a military attack if sanctions fail to dissuade North Korea. “I firmly support the United States position that all options are on the table,” he wrote. As Abe well knows, a key element in any US attack, along with the B1 bombers in Guam, would be the advanced stealth F-35 fighter jets stationed at the US Marine base in Iwakuni, Japan.
Japanese speakers made similar assertions the following day at a forum in Washington on “past diplomacy with North Korea.” Although it took place at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, it was conceived and sponsored by the US-Japan Research Institute, a Tokyo think tank sponsored by several major universities and financed by Nissan, Toyota, Sony, and other large Japanese multinationals. The basic message was that Japan’s interests must be front and center in any US negotiations with Pyongyang.
Mitoji Yabunaka, the former Japanese negotiator at the Six-Party Talks with North Korea, noted that he has heard many Americans argue that it’s “not realistic” to think North Korea will denuclearize, and that Washington should thus concentrate on managing Pyongyang’s arsenal. That “might suffice US interests,” but it is unacceptable to Japan, he said. “We are already being [threatened], so that doesn’t work for Japan.” The objective of any negotiations “must be clear—denuclearization,” Yabunaka said. “In that sense, I’m encouraged that Trump is sticking to that.”
On September 20, Abe followed Trump’s speech with an aggressive call for a naval blockade on North Korea that would block its access to “the goods, funds, people and technology” necessary for its military programs. Abe also repeated arguments that past negotiations with the North had failed because they had allowed Pyongyang to “deceive” the global community, and said the time for diplomacy was over. What’s needed to force North Korea’s denuclearization is “not dialogue, but pressure,” he said.
To many South Koreans, Abe’s intervention has effectively sidelined President Moon Jae-in.
On September 22, Japan’s Maritime Self-Defense Force joined the US Navy in drills designed to counter the North Korean threat. Finally, on Monday the 25th, Abe made his intentions clear: He was dissolving Japan’s powerful lower house and calling for a snap election in late October. “By holding an election at a time like this, I would like to test our public mandate on actions against North Korea,” he said.
To many South Koreans, Abe’s intervention has effectively sidelined President Moon. While he tacitly endorsed Trump’s rhetoric in a meeting with the US delegation during the UN session, Moon laid out a very different approach in his address to the General Assembly.
“We do not desire the collapse of North Korea,” he said. “If North Korea makes a decision even now to stand on the right side of history, we are ready to assist North Korea together with the international community.”
Korean media have also reported that Abe’s government opposed Moon’s recent decision to provide $8 million in humanitarian aid to the North despite its missile and weapons tests.
Japan’s growing influence on Trump was noted last week by Choe Sang-hun, The New York Times’s Seoul bureau chief. The day of Moon’s speech, he reported that the South Korean president is viewed by Koreans as “the odd man out,” and quoted Lee Won-deog, an academic expert on Korean-Japan relations.
“There is a suspicion that Prime Minister Abe is using his close personal chemistry with President Trump to help shape the American leader’s views on South Korea.” Abe’s loyalty to Trump was also noted last month by The Wall Street Journal. “The Japanese leader’s refusal to let any daylight come between him and Mr. Trump contrasts with other leaders who have hinted at unease with Mr. Trump’s language, including his [recent] threat to bring ‘fire and fury’ on North Korea,” it reported from Tokyo.
Moon himself has downplayed the idea of any splits, telling reporters on his plane back to Seoul, “I do not think the international community has any other option but to pressure North Korea with one voice.” But the tension between the Abe government and Moon’s was palpable upon the latter’s return from New York. In an unusual public display of anger reported by The Hankyoreh, senior South Korea officials complained bitterly to the White House that Japanese reporters, apparently with the support of their government, had “repeatedly printed distorted reports about South Korea-US-Japan summit remarks” last week as a way to weaken Moon’s position with Trump.
Outside of the obvious attempt to sideline Moon, one of the problems with the Abe-Trump alliance, according to some peace activists, is that Japan and the United States are by far the largest financial contributors to the UN and could use that clout to pressure other nations into supporting military action against North Korea. In any case, peace groups hope to persuade the UN to intervene and press for a stronger diplomatic approach.
Last Friday, Women Cross DMZ, a coalition of dozens of women’s organizations that made a peace vigil to North and South Korea in 2015, in a letter signed by nearly 300 women and over 40 major women’s organizations, wrote to UN Secretary General António Guterres urging him to “immediately appoint a Special Envoy” to de-escalate the conflict and “encourage dialogue, compromise and the peaceful resolution of tensions.” And after Trump’s appearance at the UN, three US peace organizations—CREDO Action, Win Without War, and MoveOn—condemned his threats and issued an urgent call for action. “We need to stop this slow roll toward a catastrophic war, and work towards defusing the North Korean crisis diplomatically,” they asserted.
But there might be light at the end of the tunnel. At some point during the tumultuous week, a reporter asked Trump if negotiations were still an option. “Why not?” he shot back. That’s a good sign, said DeTrani, the former intelligence officer. “Negotiations are the only way out.”
Tim Shorrock is a Washington, DC–based journalist and the author of Spies for Hire: The Secret World of Intelligence Outsourcing.
The Communist Blogs Network for the right to self-determination of the people and the celebration of the Referendum in Catalonia
The Communist Blogs Network for the right to self-determination of the people and the celebration of the Referendum in Catalonia
The Communist Blogs Network (RBC) is in favor of the right to self-determination of the people, and therefore unreservedly supports the celebration of the referendum on October 1st in Catalonia, raising the banner of proletarian internationalism high and recalling that, As in any other country, the working class is the backbone of the nation.
We are not positioned on the independence or not of the Catalan nation, because that's the thing that corresponds to the Catalans to determine it; but, without any hesitation, we defend your right to hold a referendum to decide and, if that is the will of the people, to carry it out in the face of the rejection of the regime of 78, who fears that the forced continuation, of the "Spain One, Great and Free" of General Franco and the Bourbons, imposed against the will of the towns of Spain, is about to collapse.
As Comrade José Díaz defended in his speech on June 2, 1935 in the Monumental Cinema of Madrid, the points of his program of the Popular Front was that of the "Liberation of all the towns oppressed by Spanish imperialism .
That the right to freely govern be granted to Catalonia, Euzkadi, Galicia and to how many nationalities they are oppressed by the imperialism of Spain. "
he said
"Is the current Government solving the problem of oppressed nationalities?
I tell you no. And the test is this process that is followed by the most reactionary court of the country against the counselors of the Generalitat.
He will rest on them the weight of a monstrous sentence. Thirty years in prison they ask, and there is no doubt that they will be sentenced to this sentence. And you know why they will be condemned? Because this process is not only the one of the men to whom it is judged.
Who will be condemned with this sentence is all the people of Catalonia, for their rebellion, for their uprising against the oppression of Spanish imperialism.
And against this monstrous condemnation, against the hatred of the freedom of Catalonia, I tell you before: is it that we must we not fight in the Popular Antifascist Front for the liberation of these men, which is condemned as an expression of the hatred and imperialist oppression?
Well, then, comrades, we have one more reason to join us all: the struggle for the liberation of Catalonia and all the oppressed nationalities to have their destinies ».
José Díaz, leader of the PCE during the years of the Republic and the Civil War, faithfully applying the laws of Marxism-Leninism, thinking of the emancipation of the working class and that of the peoples over imperialist oppression, had no hesitation in fighting by the right of Catalonia and the rest of the peoples of Spain to decide their destiny, while still having as a guide the proletarian internationalism and the unity and collaboration of the peoples against the bourgeoisie and imperialism.
The RBC, following the example of that Spanish Marxist-Leninist, José Díaz, the best leader of the working class given by the Communist Party to the Spaniards, is in favor of the celebration of the Catalan referendum so that the Catalans can decide their Own destiny, in the already noted understanding that the backbone of every nation is always its working class and that it can only lead to the rest of the classes and oppressed minorities to their future and wider liberation, national and social.
https://victoriaoprimidos.wordpress.com/2017/09/18/la-red-de-blogs-comunistas-por-el-derecho-a-la-autodeterminacion-de-los-pueblos-y-la-celebracion-del-referendum-en-cataluna/